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Apr 2020
5:18pm, 7 Apr 2020
44,489 posts
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McGoohan
The main thing for me is that it is so incredibly dated in just about every way. I think that the more recent a book, the more glaring are any examples of datedness. So, it's easier to read Dickens and accept the attitudes of another time. But this comes from 1959 and Shirley Jackson died in my lifetime, yet her characters (Americans too) talk like Trevor Howard in a 1930s British drama. In fact, not even that well as they speak in ways no human person ever did.
Stylistically as well, the writing's very heavily verbose. Even in short sentences. 'He frowned unhappily'. What, instead of those happy frowns?
And as for spooky? She's so at pains to have it all be ambiguous that almost nothing is described.
Finally, it's typical of overpraised litfic for me: poor writing that's excused because it's being seen to be literary. There's this recurring and ultimately rather pointless phrase: 'Journeys end in lovers meeting' which has a pleasing-enough rhythm but is largely meaningless in the context of the novel. In that way, it reminded me of former book group fave, The Passion (which I also hated) with its motif 'Somewhere between fear and sex passion is' - which clearly needed 'young Skywalker' to complete the sentence.
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Apr 2020
7:15am, 9 Apr 2020
44,510 posts
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McGoohan
Right, started on Little Nemo's book now 
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Apr 2020
7:17am, 9 Apr 2020
10,369 posts
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Little Nemo
Uh oh, is it a race?
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Apr 2020
7:19am, 9 Apr 2020
44,511 posts
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McGoohan
Er... it is now
Comprehension is irrelevant. On your marks....
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Apr 2020
7:21am, 9 Apr 2020
10,371 posts
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Little Nemo
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Apr 2020
7:23am, 9 Apr 2020
44,512 posts
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McGoohan
Right - finished. I just fanned out the book, put my thumb on it and flicked through the pages, reading maybe a word every other page or so. I think it's about a murder or something?
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Apr 2020
7:26am, 9 Apr 2020
10,373 posts
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Little Nemo
Er, no spoilers please!
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Apr 2020
7:28am, 9 Apr 2020
44,513 posts
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McGoohan
There's a woman or possibly a man. And another person. There's a house too. Somebody maybe called Evelyn?
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Apr 2020
7:28am, 9 Apr 2020
44,514 posts
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McGoohan
It is a real page turner. Especially when you read it like a flick-book
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Apr 2020
8:28am, 9 Apr 2020
47,227 posts
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Diogenes
I read a book about a man whose job it was in the middle-ages to roast servant boys on a spit. Now that’s what I call a page-turner.
INSORT is also a page turner: I have to keep turning back to remind myself of what I’ve read.
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